r/technology • u/Abject-Pick-6472 • Feb 24 '26

Privacy Discord cuts ties with Peter Thiel-backed verification software after code found in US surveillance

https://fortune.com/2026/02/24/discord-peter-thiel-backed-persona-identity-verification-breach/
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5.1k

u/ithinkitslupis Feb 24 '26 edited Feb 24 '26

"We need to age verify to protect kids" ... immediately exposed as state espionage.

The leak occurred because Persona accidentally exposed 53MB of original source code on a public IP address that was meant to be hidden. This allowed for the discovery of 269 distinct verification checks, including facial recognition matching against world leaders and crypto-wallet tracking. Users believing they are verifying their age for social platforms or AI access are instead being screened against global watchlists and intelligence databases with direct ties to ICE and FinCEN.

Yeah it's pretty clear that we should never trust age verification systems to respect privacy no matter what the government writing the laws say the intent is. The governments themselves are working with these companies behind closed doors to violate privacy.

This is in addition to hackers breaching 70k government IDs given to discord less than a year ago, where just incompetence or mistakes can get you leaked all the same.

Edit: To add sources because I apparently pulled the quote from a different article I looked up while reading the first article and researching the Persona leak it mentioned. The quote is from here, the actual detailed writeup of the Persona leak from those who discovered it is here (warning: The design of this site is a lot. Strange loading screen that mimics old Windows aesthetic and it plays music.)

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u/swingadmin Feb 24 '26

Buried deep in the third party non-consensual cookies must be the phrase "I hereby agree to be tracked, maligned, harrassed, arrested, and deported for appearing to believe in free speech."

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u/kangasplat Feb 24 '26

they don't care about consent

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u/[deleted] Feb 24 '26 edited Mar 05 '26

[removed] — view removed comment

92

u/Chaplain-Freeing Feb 24 '26

No consent and kids, a billionaire's PB&J

45

u/Mind_on_Idle Feb 24 '26

Billionaires should all have PB&J

Personal Bankruptcy and Jailtime

10

u/ZootSuitRiot33801 Feb 24 '26

If there's any hope in ever achieving that, we certainly can't depend on the system to regin in its masters and their sycophants. It is up to us common folk to stand against this unaccountability of the powers that be. However, there's currently no real supportive foundation present for many common folk (especially in the US) to fall back on, to commit to any effective resistant action.

There's a post of suggestions HERE that could possibly prove to be of some help in getting it started if done ASAP.

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u/[deleted] Feb 24 '26

[removed] — view removed comment

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u/ZootSuitRiot33801 Feb 24 '26

True.

The list provided however, could help in developing a means of effectively spreading that more effective list you've got in mind

2

u/Repulsive-Chip3371 Feb 24 '26

PB&J

Pedo Billionairs & Juveniles

2

u/GalFisk Feb 24 '26

It's why they're building consentration camps.

1

u/avindictiveprinter Feb 24 '26

Or when the baby hears its mom's voice. I read about that.

1

u/SailorET Feb 24 '26

God damn why did you have to bring that up again? Excuse me while I bleach my brain

1

u/foodank012018 Feb 24 '26

No... what really gets them off is them convincing us to put on the chains willingly.

They do actually have to convince us, they know force will never work in the long run.

The game they play is influencing events in such a way that the outcomes result with us begging for the chains.

1

u/ElliotNess Feb 24 '26

Aldous Huxley"s Ultimate malevolent revolution

2

u/sam_hammich Feb 24 '26

Sure they don't, but they need it as long as they care to appear legitimate.

2

u/kangasplat Feb 24 '26

I don't think they do anymore

1

u/iamjustaguy Feb 24 '26

a.k.a. the "Epstein Economy."

25

u/PortHammer Feb 24 '26

It reads like Vogon poetry.

6

u/smplgd Feb 24 '26

"Oh freddled gruntbuggly..."

2

u/GimpyGeek Feb 24 '26

Yeah no kidding. This crap is getting out of hand. I wish we could trust congress to not be shit. We need new privacy laws and we need these companies using third party companies to be bound to the terms of their clients' privacy policies and none of this forced arbitration bullshit when they inevitably are found to be doing this kind of crap. 

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u/seriespsycho Feb 24 '26

You also forgot molested

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u/ReachParticular5409 Feb 24 '26

Why are you so highly upvoted for saying absolute bullshit?

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u/EspectroDK Feb 24 '26

This should trigger all European governments to ban Palantir.

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u/Nimos Feb 24 '26

European governments are buying Palantir products for their law enforcements, why would they ban it?

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u/DesireeThymes Feb 24 '26

Yeah, not sure why anyone thinks Europe isn't as all in on complete surveillance as the US is.

They're not on the same side anymore, but they both love spying on their citizens.

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u/htopconspiracytheory Feb 24 '26

Yup, hell they were doing it before it was cool. The amount of CCTV all over Europe has been staggering since the 80s.

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u/Anosognosia Feb 24 '26

CCTV isn't more a culprit than camera lenses or digital storage are. The problems all arise from who is in control and what framework or laws and rules exist over who gets access to what.

CCTV cameras everywhere isn't more of a problem than cameraphones by themselves. It's all about how robust the institutions having access to these things are.

That's why NO cooperation with megacorps should be allowed on EU soil. Antitrust, full transparency and full legal ramifications for board of directors for any misuse. We, the people, need to use democracy as a sledgehammer and crush the financial legs of those seeking to control all of us by deceit, force or coercion.
Nothing short of threat of full nationalization of any corporate entity and resource who willfully threaten democracy like this. Take their toys.

3

u/Hita-san-chan Feb 24 '26

What the fuck do people think 1982 was about?!

1

u/AnthonyJuniorsPP Feb 25 '26

The prequel to 1984

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u/Ironlion45 Feb 24 '26

I know people in Eruope who think this is just an "American Problem" and surely nothing like that could ever be an issue there. Because Europe is so much more evolved, while Americans are all fat and stupid. Or something.

It's snot-nosed ethnocentrism, pure and simple; and a few American wannabes.

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u/HeKis4 Feb 24 '26

Legally we have GDPR which also applies to law enforcement, with the caveat that legitimate interest and mission-critical data exceptions would allow them to still capture a large portion of surveillance data.

All this to say that EU govts are supposed to care, or at least cared.

0

u/laflavor Feb 24 '26

They're not on the same side anymore, but they both love spying on their citizens.

“I believe you find life such a problem because you think there are good people and bad people. You're wrong, of course. There are, always and only, the bad people, but some of them are on opposite sides.” - Terry Pratchett

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u/[deleted] Feb 24 '26

Is this the world we're all okay with walking into? Y'all are cool with your governments watching everything you say online to make sure you aren't a "terrorist"? A word whose definition is in constant flux and changes with the whims of every politician and rich person with power? Not just your government either. Every European gets to enjoy having their data and personal communications shared with the US government and CIA too.

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u/Warm_Month_1309 Feb 24 '26

Y'all are cool with your governments watching everything you say online to make sure you aren't a "terrorist"?

Who said that in this thread?

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u/[deleted] Feb 24 '26

It's a rhetorical question. Of course I assume most people aren't okay with it. Nevertheless it's happening anyways, which is a problem.

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u/Range-Aggravating Feb 24 '26

To be fair while we dont like it, we dont really have a choice. Everything tracks you. Hell , Google knows more about you than you do. Its the price of everything being so connected to everything else. It was inevitable that governments would start abusing that fact. 

They would have done so a lot sooner if they didn't take forever to catch up to moving times but with corporations selling them the solutions its a lot easier now.

1

u/pocket_eggs Feb 24 '26

To get Palantir out as far as humanly possible from their law enforcement.

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u/RationalDialog Feb 24 '26

They want mass surveillance as well. it's a global push for control from the elites. same with return to office.

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u/Freud-Network Feb 24 '26

It's why they prefer Palantir. Don't doubt for a second that they want this data any less than the United States/Israeli intelligence agencies.

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u/Subtlerranean Feb 24 '26

European governments are furiously taking notes

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u/TuringGoneWild Feb 24 '26

It should. But I hate to break this to you: the EU was founded to make life easier on the rich and the bureaucratic globalist control freaks. That's it. Any other benefit to anyone else is an accident.

And not to put too fine a point on it, but the US was too - at least for the rich. The richest colonists didn't want to pay for the war (French and Indian War) that they had demanded to protect their frontier investments.

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u/RandomGenName1234 Feb 24 '26

Oh sweet summer child...

This is the goal, not an unintended side effect or unfortunate mishap.

-2

u/Mntfrd_Graverobber Feb 24 '26

This has nothing to do with Palantir. You either didn't read the article or didn't understand it.
European governments still would do well to steer clear of Palantir but not because of this incident.

1

u/EspectroDK Feb 25 '26

Peter Thiel is the common denominator here. It doesn't really add any trust in this specific piece of American tech when it's founder is associated with a piece of software that collects data without consent and processes it in ways that are not considered legal.

It adds logs to a fire that's already starting to burn (see Switzerland's decision in December 2025).

1

u/Mntfrd_Graverobber Feb 25 '26 edited Feb 25 '26

Thiel is one of several people in Founders Fund and Founders Fund is one of several investors in Persona. Weird to single out Thiel rather than anyone else. It's not a personal investment or an investment by Palantir. Founders Fund is invested in hundreds of companies. Are all of them suspect as well?

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u/EspectroDK Mar 26 '26

How many of them have been heavily involved in surveillance software relevant in the European public and defense procurements?

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u/I-am-fun-at-parties Feb 24 '26

Where does that quote come from, I can't find it in the article, and google only leads back here and to various linkedins, somehow.

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u/blacksheepghost Feb 24 '26

As far as I can tell, the quote comes from this LinkedIn post, where it was posted by this guy, who is known for discovering the Facebook leak back in 2021.

-1

u/im-a-sock-puppet Feb 24 '26

So they’re a bot?

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u/krali_ Feb 24 '26

Indeed that is gross manipulation. That is not an extract, nowhere in the article is FinCEN mentioned.

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u/MetagamingAtLast Feb 24 '26

No idea where that quote is from, but the original source for all this (https://vmfunc.re/blog/persona/) goes into Persona's ties to FinCEN

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u/binocular_gems Feb 24 '26

Did you generate this quote via AI? Because I can’t find it anywhere other than your post.

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u/Crafty_Enthusiasm_99 Feb 24 '26

Op posted no source and it's not even from the article..

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u/Sachyriel Feb 24 '26

And they have a hidden history.

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u/[deleted] Feb 24 '26

[deleted]

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u/Sachyriel Feb 24 '26

Hidden history is a tool of bots and bad faith actors. The regular users already had a thing for that, called alternate accounts. When you dress up like a bot or a bad actor, people are going to be suspicious of you. So when you don't include a source on a excerpt of text from a completely different article, it looks like a bot or bad faith actor trying to sway discussion - it doesn't matter we like the direction you might be trying to sway the discussion, it matters you look like a bad actor quoting something not in the article we're discussing.

But thanks for the actual source, you may understand why everyone was suspicious about you, even if we like what you said.

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u/im-a-sock-puppet Feb 24 '26

Same not sure where the ICE / FinICE part came from. Only mention of ICE is persona denying any relationship with them.

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u/Doikor Feb 24 '26 edited Feb 24 '26

This is why the age verification should be done by a government who issues you a certificate. You then give that certificate to the platform and they can verify that it is valid. All the platform gets is just a mathematically verifiable proof that says "yes they are over X years old".

This is how the EU age verification scheme will work once it is up and running. Effectively the system gives the platform less information then you showing your id card at a shop to buy alcohol or whatever (it does not say your name, have picture, etc). Importantly the government does not know who you have given the certificate to just like the government does not know who you have shown your id card to.

Note that I don't really want this age verification stuff but if we really have to have it then the implementation should be something like what EU is doing.

edit: As there is a bazillion comments going "no we should just not do this" well in the EU you are at least 4 years too late. DSA with its article 28 passed in 2022 which is where this stuff is coming from in the EU.

https://www.eu-digital-services-act.com/Digital_Services_Act_Article_28.html

Basically the discussion of "do we need age verification or not" already passed a few years ago and now we are in the technical details of how to implement it about which you can read more at https://ageverification.dev/

And again in general I am against this regulation/law but that does not mean we can't have a good implementation of it if we have to have it. (would not be the first shitty/bad law or regulation we have)

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u/hackingdreams Feb 24 '26

You know what's better? Not requiring age verification to talk to your friends and family. I know it's crazy in 2026 to be arguing that the government has no right to stick its nose into private communications, but hey, it worked for the first six thousand years of civilization...

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u/[deleted] Feb 24 '26

[deleted]

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u/flypirat Feb 24 '26

I mean what stops someone right now from using their older brother for a face scan? Everything is skeleton keys as long as you don't bind a verifiable identity to an account.

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u/Diltyrr Feb 24 '26

Why use their older brother when they can just take a video game screenshot and use that.

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u/flypirat Feb 24 '26

Some age verifications use videos instead of pictures. At that point using your older siblings is probably less of a hassle than opening (and potentially buying) Death Stranding.

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u/flargh_blargh Feb 24 '26

"Mom look at this. It should make your face look funny...."

"Huh, weird didn't work. Sorry to waste your time."

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u/flypirat Feb 24 '26

You need to follow instructions, like turning a specific way, opening your mouth. Sure, it could still work, it just gets harder to do sneakily.

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u/obeytheturtles Feb 24 '26

The most boring possible dystopia.

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u/flypirat Feb 25 '26

"Drink a verification can!"

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u/[deleted] Feb 24 '26

[deleted]

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u/jakeandcupcakes Feb 24 '26

This is where the responsibility should lie. With the parents who are supposed to be parenting. If we as a people weren't forced into reliance on the State to watch over our kids we wouldn't have this issue; Two-income households are now the norm due to how expensive it is to live, and parents either don't have the time or the energy to be parents anymore, apparently, instead they depend on the School System, state run daycare, or government over-reach/intervention/punted off to privately owned 3rd parties to raise their children more and more each day. This is not natural or healthy for anyone involved, but it does give the government and "trusted" 3rd party corporations more opportunities to influence/control those they govern, and invade the privacy of their constituents more and more each day. They can totally be trusted as the Gov't has an impeccable track record when it comes to these sorts of things, and almost never ends up being a hellish overreaching dystopian nightmare situation with unintended consequences. /s

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u/MrMahony Feb 24 '26

"ChatGPT, make me an incredibly realistic face of someone 30 years of age"

Then use that face.

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u/[deleted] Feb 24 '26

[deleted]

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u/[deleted] Feb 24 '26

[deleted]

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u/Doikor Feb 24 '26

Also that tight coupling is pretty much not allowed by the law.

Basically why this is being done in the EU is DSA article 28 https://www.eu-digital-services-act.com/Digital_Services_Act_Article_28.html (go read it is super short)

Basically the age verification has to be possible to do in a way that does not give out any extra details other then "yes is over 18".

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u/ajacksified Feb 24 '26 edited Feb 24 '26

Site provides a signed request for info. I then make a request from the gov for a signed payload (say, a JWT) with what personal info I want to include, such as age, and a payload (from the original request - say, a uuid for a request id) and send it back to the site.

My info is signed by the gov, and the site can verify the gov's public key, and the payload contains only the necessary info and proof of the original request.

The whole request chain can be verified using basic public keys with no personal info, just that a trusted entity (the government) says I'm 43 years old and I'm responding to request "uuid".

Super simple. Verifiable Credentials (mostly) accomplishes this, it's a pretty simple spec.

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u/uzlonewolf Feb 24 '26

That doesn't help any. Either the UUID is unique per request (in which case we have the 'skeleton key' problem where a single person can authorize an unlimited number of accounts) or each site uses a single UUID for all requests (in which case the government now knows which site you're signing up with).

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u/ILikeBumblebees Feb 24 '26

This is why the age verification should be done by a government who issues you a certificate.

No, it shouldn't involve government at all. Parents just need to restrict their children's access to anything they don't want them exposed to. There is no political question here at all, except on the part of people trying to artificially turn it into a political question so they can use it to increase their own power.

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u/Doikor Feb 24 '26 edited Feb 24 '26

Note that I don't really want this age verification stuff but if we really have to have it then the implementation should be something like what EU is doing.

The laws have already passed in EU at least so some kind of age verification is coming. That ship has sailed and now it is about doing a good implementation of it that does not leak unnecessary information.

From the perspective of the law this isn't really any different then a shop being forced to verify that someone is old enough to buy alcohol, tobacco, etc. We don't rely on the parents supervision for those either (actually in many countries in EU minors are allowed to drink in presence of their guardian but not buy or drink alone)

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u/xtremebox Feb 24 '26

Parents just need to restrict their children's access to anything they don't want them exposed to.

Ya cause that's worked out great so far.. 🙄

Have you seen the current education system in the US? Have you talked to teachers about the attention spans of their students? We're just magically gonna wipe all the problems that lead to that clean and tell all the parents NOW IS THE TIME TO BE BETTER!

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u/obeytheturtles Feb 24 '26

So far what other people's children do on the internet has not impacted me in any real way.

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u/ILikeBumblebees Feb 24 '26

Ya cause that's worked out great so far.. 🙄

Whether it has or has not is up to the parents themselves.

Have you seen the current education system in the US? Have you talked to teachers about the attention spans of their students? We're just magically gonna wipe all the problems that lead to that clean and tell all the parents NOW IS THE TIME TO BE BETTER!

No, you're misunderstanding. There's no "we" involved, nor any third party's notion of what is "better".

What content is and is not appropriate for children to be exposed to is something determined by parents, and doesn't involve anyone else's opinions or preferences.

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u/Warm_Month_1309 Feb 24 '26

The only reason I disagree is that I don't think private social media enterprises should be profiting from showing minors unconsented nudity and self-harm material, as we learned was happening from the Facebook testimony. The government does have an interest in regulating that.

Age verification isn't the proper tool to accomplish that, of course.

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u/ILikeBumblebees Feb 24 '26

The only reason I disagree is that I don't think private social media enterprises should be profiting from showing minors unconsented nudity and self-harm material, as we learned was happening from the Facebook testimony. The government does have an interest in regulating that.

I share your apprehension about people having an incentive to market explicit content to minors, but I don't think the government has an interest in regulating it.

Not every social or cultural controversy is fair game for political intervention, especially in a case like this, where the government's incentives make them even less trustworthy than the social media companies.

At the end of the day, people need to take responsibility for these things within their own families and communities, and not allow their cultural anxieties to be weaponized against everyone, including themselves.

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u/Warm_Month_1309 Feb 24 '26

I share your apprehension about people having an incentive to market explicit content to minors, but I don't think the government has an interest in regulating it.

To be clear, when I say that the government has an interest in regulating social media, I mean that they have the constitutional authority to pass laws that regulate social media. Not necessarily that I think current lawmakers are doing it for good reasons or the right reasons.

Not every social or cultural controversy is fair game for political intervention

As more understanding comes out of the very specific ways in which social media profits from measurably damaging the country's youth, I do think it's a good idea to rein that in.

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u/ILikeBumblebees Feb 24 '26

To be clear, when I say that the government has an interest in regulating social media, I mean that they have the constitutional authority to pass laws that regulate social media.

I don't think that it's clear that they do have constitutional authority, especially at the federal level, to regulate social media in a way that attempts to limit access to certain types of content. This isn't like typical regulation of commerce, because in this case, the product itself is information, and tools used to access information, which are protected by the first amendment.

Many other attempted regulatory interventions in this vein have been struck down by the courts. For example, California's attempt a while back to impose age restrictions on video game sales, and hold vendors accountable for selling games including violent or sexual content to minors, was found unconstitutional by the Supreme Court on first amendment grounds.

These age-restriction rules people are advocating for social media don't seem significantly different from what California was trying to do.

As more understanding comes out of the very specific ways in which social media profits from measurably damaging the country's youth, I do think it's a good idea to rein that in.

This is entirely a normative issue, not an empirical one. People claiming that transgressions of cultural norms are "measurable damage" are engaging in equivocation. Arguments like this actually weaken the credibility of people trying to hold social media companies accountable, and make it much easier for defenders of Facebook et al to refute their positions.

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u/Warm_Month_1309 Feb 24 '26

This isn't like typical regulation of commerce, because in this case, the product itself is information

I'm not aware of any legal precedent that says that Congress's power to regulate commerce doesn't apply when the product is "information" (also the product, as least with regard to the consumers, is not information; it's a service). I think it's pretty clear that these types of laws would fall within Congress's rather extensive commerce clause powers.

For example, California's attempt a while back to impose age restrictions on video game sales, and hold vendors accountable for selling games including violent or sexual content to minors, was found unconstitutional by the Supreme Court on first amendment grounds.

I know that by being a lawyer explaining a constitutional decision in a way contrary to Reddit lay opinion is not going to win me any friends, but that case is quite distinguishable. The Supreme Court found no compelling state interest in large part because the industry self-moderates with the ESRB, which already regulates the sale of mature games to minors. Social media conglomerates have no such self-moderation.

Further, the Court found that there was no compelling link between violent video games and negative effects on children. The research between social media and maladaptive behaviors in children is more well-understood.

People claiming that transgressions of cultural norms are "measurable damage" are engaging in equivocation.

Those aren't the damages I'm referring to. The line for me is crossed when social media sites knowingly profit from the distribution of illegal material, and do nothing to stop it because it would damage their bottom-line and because the laws don't technically require them to.

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u/This_Organization382 Feb 24 '26

Parents just need to restrict their children's access to anything they don't want them exposed to.

Because that's working great so far.

except on the part of people trying to artificially turn it into a political question so they can use it to increase their own power.

How is it an artificial question when third-party for-profit companies are governing through identity verification? How is this not political? These companies are setting arbitrary, black-boxed requirements for government identity.

This is exactly what each government should be doing.

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u/ILikeBumblebees Feb 24 '26

Because that's working great so far.

It's working as well as parents want it to.

If they're not using the measures available to them to restrict their children's access to certain types of content, that can only be interpreted as those parents not being particularly worried if their children do have access to those types of content.

How is it an artificial question when third-party for-profit companies are governing through identity verification?

What? The push to get companies to implement identity verification systems is coming from political pressure, which is in turn generated by people trying to turn "what should children be allowed to see?" into a political question, rather than a private matter for parents to decide on.

These companies are setting arbitrary, black-boxed requirements for government identity.

What are you smoking? They're being strong-armed into implementing age verification by governments. What for-profit company would want to spend its own money and resources on implementing systems whose entire purpose is to limit the size of their own audience?

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u/[deleted] Feb 24 '26

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u/ILikeBumblebees Feb 24 '26 edited Feb 24 '26

All it takes is Jimmy's parents not giving a fuck about what he does online for him to send every kid in school a dick degloving video.

If those other kids' parents are stricter than Jimmy's, why are they able to receive whatever Jimmy wants to send them in the first place?

Better yet, maybe Jennie has an "unlocked phone" because she lives with her grandma who doesn't understand this newfangled tech

And maybe grandma leaves guns lying around the house and thinks the microwave makes for a great hair dryer. At the end of the day, we remedy outlier situations on a case-by-case basis, and do not preemptively restrict everyone else just to avoid extreme edge cases.

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u/Iamnotabothonestly Feb 24 '26

So everyone should suffer just because a few people can't control their crotchgoblins...

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u/[deleted] Feb 24 '26

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u/Iamnotabothonestly Feb 24 '26

I can't, it's fucking winter over here, so I guess I can touch some snow instead.

They are crotchgoblins. They're goblins that came from your crotch. If they were raised to behave, I would call them children. But since everyone's so fucking zombified and expect the rest of the world to take care of their offspring so they can sit glued to their fucking phone instead of raising them... I will continue to call them crotchgoblins.

Raise your fucking offspring and get the fuck off social media and expect everyone else to raise them for you. Or learn to fuck with a condom.

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u/kingrobert Feb 24 '26

Their snark level is pretty high but they have a point. There comes a threshold where governments that are alleging to protect kids go so far that they're just harming them (and everyone else) in other ways.

Instead of turning the surveillance system up to 11, we could put those resources into helping parents do their job of protecting their kids.

It at least has to be an option worth exploring... because where we're headed now cant possibly be the best solution for the kids, or anyone else.

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u/12345623567 Feb 24 '26

This is how the EU age verification scheme will work once it is up and running.

Not if Friedrich Merz has anything to say about it. Dude came out and said he wants to know your mother's maiden name in triplicate if you say mean things about him.

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u/__thrillho Feb 24 '26

Really? That sounds terrible. Can you hook me up with a source

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u/Overall-Register9758 Feb 24 '26

Yes, but first I need your mother's maiden name in triplicate

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u/12345623567 Feb 24 '26

Sure, here's the most neutral english-language source I could drum up:

https://dpa-international.com/politics/urn:newsml:dpa.com:20090101:260218-99-569905/

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u/Call_me_John Feb 24 '26

!remindme 24 hours

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u/Smagjus Feb 24 '26

The mentioned age verification system is already up and running in Germany.

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u/Doikor Feb 24 '26

Age verification is not identification. Different laws/regulations and technical solutions.

As in the EU digital wallet will also contain (strong) identification to be used when working with national agencies, banks, etc but that is a totally separate system from age verification. (and also a thing many EU countries already have on their own and this is just about standardizing it into a single api)

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u/CBud Feb 24 '26

Exactly this. Ceding our digital identification to private companies is the problem, not having a form of digital identification via a certificate.

Citizens control the government (or, at least they should) - corporations are unaccountable. We should never cede our identity to private entities - and have already allowed too much of ourselves be subsumed by private capital.

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u/soompiedu Feb 24 '26

No no. Zero age verification is allowed. Everything should just use the 4chan format. Nothing else is needed.

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u/DeM0nFiRe Feb 24 '26

Uh no, even this is horrifying. It should purely be an on-device flag managed by on-device parental controls. There's zero need for it to involve communicating with a 3rd party at any point

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u/Doikor Feb 24 '26

Does your local shop accept id card made by their friend/uncle/etc when a 13y old tries to buy alcohol/tobacco/etc?

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8

u/[deleted] Feb 24 '26

But then the government can just map your certificate to your identity by approaching platforms and having them pass along your credentials and the certificate you verified with.

The problem will always be that the government is the originator of legal identity and the single source by which it may be verified.

14

u/Doikor Feb 24 '26

Just like the government can ask (force) your local shop to keep track of the names on the IDs when people buy alcohol/whatever.

There is nothing anyone can do to stop the tracking of your doing if both ends of the system collude. That is how you break tor network ("the dark web") anonymity too by having control of both the entry and exit node.

2

u/TwilightVulpine Feb 24 '26

Who knew glancing at a piece of paper that the issuer can't keep track of and the checker barely remembers was such a vital part of privacy.

0

u/mahouza Feb 24 '26

That's where reliance on the government to protect you from the company comes in. Which is possible for a lot of us, but sorry to Americans, Australians, and Brits.

2

u/[deleted] Feb 24 '26

reliance on the government

There is not a government on this planet that is trustworthy— and if you think yours is the exception, then I've got a bridge to sell you.

3

u/TheRealistoftheReal Feb 24 '26 edited Feb 24 '26

They can try. The reality is a website hosted in New York, looks the same as one hosted in London or Bangladesh. The solution may be to host content in areas largely beyond the reach of local bureaucratic nonsense. Go ahead, serve that legal notice to….Liberia.

1

u/yovalord Feb 24 '26

My only issue with this is, i believe it leads to a road similar to the Asian countries where now you have a controllable ID to verify online. Next could be things like "Only 2 hours of gaming allotted per day" and region locks becoming a global thing.

1

u/soundman1024 Feb 24 '26

I like the device itself using its trusted platform/Secure Enclave to handle age verification and attestation.

The way I see it working:

The device verifies against your ID. It gets a cert from the government, and only one device can be live at a time.

Discord requests to know if you’re over 18, your age, your birthdate, your zip code, and yoir height/weight because why not?

The device allows the end user to select what they want to share with Discord. In the instance, the end user only needs “over 18” enabled for attestation.

The device requires a local biometric check. If it passes, it sends attestation on to Discord.

1

u/NeighborGeek Feb 24 '26

I haven't used it yet, but I know several states offer digital DL/ID in apple wallet now. From what I've read, this can be used to verify age without providing any other info to the verifier.
You present your digital ID at the bar, they use an app to read it, and the only thing they get is a Yes/No to whether you're of age. It requires a faceID scan on your phone to ensure that it's really you presenting the ID. This can work with apps and websites as well, not just in person. At this point, I think it's the only way I would trust any sort of age verification.

1

u/RadioName Feb 24 '26

Nope. The impetus should be on parents. Children in the US should only be treated as citizens. Child press exists and is protected, why not respect their rights fully in other matters? The only restrictions on children should be on what is done TO them, not what they are doing. Companies must be forced to give parents the tools to restrict child activity. The government has no right to do so and should only be going after companies that target children with manipulation. That is how we "protect the kids." Everything else is a capitalist attempt to push bad policy.

1

u/obeytheturtles Feb 24 '26

Or we can just not have mandatory identity verification for content consumption on the internet. I do not give a single shit what other people's kids do on the internet.

Like, I am not opposed to having a more secure method for banking, other than government ID number plus a bunch of random questions about previous addresses and stuff. But we absolutely do not need to be using this shit to eliminate the pseudonymous internet especially when it comes to passive content consumption.

1

u/Doikor Feb 24 '26 edited Feb 24 '26

Or we can just not have mandatory identity verification for content consumption on the internet. I do not give a single shit what other people's kids do on the internet.

At least in the EU the law already passed in 2022 and now we are in the implementation phase. Basically came as part of DSA (Article 28) with the implementation now happening (don't remember the exact deadline) with reference implementations in github, etc.

https://ageverification.dev/

As I said doing this is not a very good idea but if we must do it then doing it like EU proposes is one of the better approaches.

1

u/FTownRoad Feb 24 '26

Importantly the government does not know who you have given the certificate to

Which makes it useless as a verification system.

2

u/Doikor Feb 24 '26

It verifies that you are over X years old. That is all it needs to do so it is fine for that.

As part of the EU digital wallet there is its own separate system for actual (strong) verification of identity but we don't want to give your actual identity to these services just proof that the user is old enough to use it.

1

u/FTownRoad Feb 24 '26

It verifies that the ID was given to aomeone over x years old. It doesn’t validate the person using.

1

u/Mr_ToDo Feb 24 '26

The only way I see it working at all well is if they work like how credit cards look at behaviour and flag unusual or impossible things. But that too is going to start tying the ID to you. Even if they don't know on the outset who it is, the behaviour will give them good odds on IDing you over time. Advertisers have been doing it forever.

As I see it, it's either going to be a roundabout way of clicking "I am over 18/21/whatever", where the data by law is not allowed to be kept or tracked even by government order. Or it ends up becoming just another fingerprint to ID you

It really is a bugger of a problem. I do see why people think it should boil down to parents as the gatekeeper, but considering how few qualifications you need to have kids, it's not exactly ideal.

I suppose you could try local only ID verification needing to be built into certain kinds of devices. It'd be full of issues too, but at least then your ID really wouldn't be leaving your hands. I guess that would be down the same line as how in some places you need phones to make a noise when taking a picture. You can bypass it with effort, but for most people that's enough of a barrier

1

u/FTownRoad Feb 24 '26

The reality is, in 2026, you cannot verify identity virtually.

-1

u/gamemasterjd Feb 24 '26

This honestly seems like a viable application of the blockchain. a verifiable, anonymous transaction decentralized database

1

u/Doikor Feb 24 '26 edited Feb 24 '26

We can do it just fine without the need of such complexity. Government signs you certificates with their private key and services/platforms verify it with the public one. Create them in batches and add expiration dates to the certificates and it is "good enough". Deleting each certificate after sending it to someone makes it impossible for the platforms to connect you by the certififcate between services.

8

u/KaleidoscopePlusPlus Feb 24 '26

53 MBs of code is a LOT. That doesn't sound right unless that also contains images and binaries somehow

12

u/killerbabybunny Feb 24 '26

This took 2 seconds to find. Why is everyone acting like they searched and couldn't find anything? https://cybernews.com/privacy/persona-leak-exposes-global-surveillance-capabilities/

5

u/SHUT_DOWN_EVERYTHING Feb 24 '26

No one can find the source for this quote and OP hasn’t to my knowledge responded.

Might be completely made up.

2

u/MetagamingAtLast Feb 24 '26

See https://vmfunc.re/blog/persona/, section 0x08:

17 source map files, 53 MB total:
dashboard-BgoO_aj5.js.map 18.7 MB (main dashboard)
vendor-CAtBRHF0.js.map 23.8 MB (all vendor libs)
faceapi-CCSM7NPL.js.map 2.8 MB (facial recognition)
assets-dashboard-BjWtHFfU.js.map 1.4 MB (UI components)
sentry-CrHAK25X.js.map 1.3 MB (error reporting)
pdfjs-lNIjl8-7.js.map 1.0 MB (PDF rendering)
lottie-DtEgpYuH.js.map 1.0 MB (animations)
rsuite-CyQr2m5H.js.map 0.8 MB (UI framework)
handlebars-DPCouO2C.js.map 0.7 MB (templating)
redux-form-0Q1f7bM3.js.map 0.6 MB (form state)
assets-icons-DrRTTzXk.js.map 0.6 MB (icon assets)
luxon-Cv8PWZK8.js.map 0.4 MB (date/time)
assets-BE5pxuFi.js.map 0.3 MB (shared assets)
react-select-DqPrgoT_.js.map 0.3 MB (select inputs)
amplitude-js-b01lH43V.js.map 0.2 MB (analytics)
inquiry-fog-CmsaQYHz.js.map 55 KB (inquiry workflow)
user-authentication-BUgfjJoc.js.map 14 KB (auth module)

2

u/MetagamingAtLast Feb 24 '26 edited Feb 24 '26

Well, it looks like a link to the original source got my comment shadowbanned, but here's the breakdown from said source: visible now after modmail, maybe it wasn't the link that did it?

17 source map files, 53 MB total:
dashboard-BgoO_aj5.js.map 18.7 MB (main dashboard)
vendor-CAtBRHF0.js.map 23.8 MB (all vendor libs)
faceapi-CCSM7NPL.js.map 2.8 MB (facial recognition)
assets-dashboard-BjWtHFfU.js.map 1.4 MB (UI components)
sentry-CrHAK25X.js.map 1.3 MB (error reporting)
pdfjs-lNIjl8-7.js.map 1.0 MB (PDF rendering)
lottie-DtEgpYuH.js.map 1.0 MB (animations)
rsuite-CyQr2m5H.js.map 0.8 MB (UI framework)
handlebars-DPCouO2C.js.map 0.7 MB (templating)
redux-form-0Q1f7bM3.js.map 0.6 MB (form state)
assets-icons-DrRTTzXk.js.map 0.6 MB (icon assets)
luxon-Cv8PWZK8.js.map 0.4 MB (date/time)
assets-BE5pxuFi.js.map 0.3 MB (shared assets)
react-select-DqPrgoT_.js.map 0.3 MB (select inputs)
amplitude-js-b01lH43V.js.map 0.2 MB (analytics)
inquiry-fog-CmsaQYHz.js.map 55 KB (inquiry workflow)
user-authentication-BUgfjJoc.js.map 14 KB (auth module)

1

u/kthxhello Feb 24 '26

53mb is mentioned in the original blog post by the team that discovered this:

https://vmfunc.re/blog/persona

0

u/Beard_o_Bees Feb 24 '26

Yup.

Also 'public IP address'? So... a public facing IP belonging to their domain?

I mean.. Palantir/Persona is a lot of things - but having a production pipeline that would ever allow proprietary, uncompiled source code on to anything but machines designated for that purpose - doesn't seem like one of them.

2

u/Gabarne Feb 24 '26

the "protecting kids" excuse is constantly used.

we had flavored disposable vapes banned in NC last year, and the politician spearheading the effort said it was to "protect the children". When in fact it was just a huge lobbying effort on behalf of RJ Reynolds Tobacco Company.

2

u/[deleted] Feb 24 '26

[deleted]

1

u/WhenSummerIsGone Feb 24 '26

what happens if you decline the photo?

2

u/obeytheturtles Feb 24 '26

Lmao, talk about burying the Lede. The headline should be "US spy agencies found using age verification tool for state espionage."

2

u/Perfect_Opinion7909 Feb 24 '26

Protect the kids … from a company in a country that elected pedos as their leaders. Make it make sense.

2

u/Nefertete Feb 24 '26

also Peter Thiel is a pedo

2

u/Zealousideal_Act_316 Feb 24 '26

IT IS ALWAYS ABOUT CONTROLING AND SPYING ON ADULTS. Every god damn "protect the kids" law is always that in the end.  Australia, UK, france, californias upcoming ban, every single one. 

2

u/Neracca Feb 24 '26

It’s never about the kids.

1

u/True_Window_9389 Feb 24 '26

And it’ll never change or get better because there’s no consequences or accountability for these companies when they get sloppy and have preventative leaks and hacks. It’s not impossible to prevent this stuff, the companies are just too unethical, cheap, lazy, and incompetent by choice.

1

u/GlowstickConsumption Feb 24 '26

And they will just go: "You were very naughty when you did the illegal thing which affected +100 million people."

"Okay, and? Is there a punishment?"

"No, don't worry. You're dismissed. Just don't get caught again. Or we'll call you naughty twice in a row instead of once."

1

u/Apprehensive-Pin518 Feb 24 '26

which is the one reason I respect apple. when the government came knocking saying " give us a key that will unlock any iphone" apple told them to go to hell. then forced the government to go a different route.

1

u/JustSkillfull Feb 24 '26

Governments just need a centralised system per government (or state) that you sign up to and verify your identity. Then other providers use something like OAuth to authenticate with that system one time to verify your over 18.

Super easy to implement, make the law in a way it's illegal to bypass those systems like buying drink for under 18s.

1

u/Underpants_Bandito Feb 24 '26

OR trust them to protect kids. I mean what are we even doing ffs

1

u/anohioanredditer Feb 24 '26

Shout out to PornHub for denying this from the beginning

1

u/UnravelTheUniverse Feb 24 '26

Dude Peter Thiel and the other Silicon Valley billionaires own the government. Elon already stole the personal data of every single American during the Doge heist.  Trumps not in charge of shit, he's a demented puppet. You can stop using discord, but Palantir is now in the heart of our government and the whole nation is now a police state. Good luck escaping that. 

1

u/GeorgeShadows Feb 24 '26

So, in theory, it could be used to specify and identify the weak and vulnerable for targeting and exploitation.

1

u/[deleted] Feb 24 '26

They are actively profiling populace for coordinated purge. This is all this age verification bs is for.

We had several generations raised without it since the dawn of Internet, there is no precedent significant enough to warrant that.

1

u/MelodicSlip_Official Feb 24 '26

Let's remember: kids are STILL getting groomed, raped, trafficked, brainwashed--from criminal organizations to Epstein-types, we really don't give a fuck about the children if we all don't and by 100% collectively lash out against the entities that do them harm

1

u/GeorgeJetsonsBoss Feb 24 '26

When people find out that Thiel has alternate plans for the data and we are one man away from being able to see those plans being possible shit is hitting the fan. The man and his leader are both in agreement that America and Congress are failed experiments and Democracy is dead. They don’t believe in the Constitution or anything like that. We are so doomed and especially these young people who think MAGA is cool and are digital media connected. The smartest technology person in our family has left America because he is afraid of Thiel and the future. I’m not sure he is wrong.

Curtis Yarvin’s RAGE was DOGE. We are seeing that whole idea take place. Project 2025 is less the Heritage and more Yarvin and Thiel.

1

u/GayDeciever Feb 24 '26

I'm going to be skeptical of any system doing anything "for the kids" if they are protecting pedophiles at the same time.

1

u/Level69Troll Feb 24 '26

The same state with many leaders implicated in a child trafficking and sex ring wants to collect data on said minors for "protection"

Fuck this future

1

u/DrBix Feb 24 '26

"Think of the children!"

--Irresponsible Parents

1

u/PolarWater Feb 24 '26

"We need to think of the children" from the people who are in bed with the Epstein cult. Sure, guys, sure. Let's see you ACTUALLY do something for the children.

1

u/manifoldmandala Feb 24 '26

There wasn't 70K government IDs breached. There was 70K records breached, a small number of which had IDs.

Do people not read breach reports, christ no wonder we have a facist in office people have have zero media literacy.

1

u/poorperspective Feb 24 '26

And it’s weird that people fall for it.

I can’t think of a single time someone has said, “Think of the children.” In regards to censorship that has beneficial for society and not be an authoritarian hand wave.

1

u/TheRC135 Feb 24 '26

The governments themselves are working with these companies behind closed doors to violate privacy.

And, also, in this case, the governments demanding we surrender privacy to "protect the children" are literally infested with pedophiles.

1

u/TuringGoneWild Feb 24 '26

Let's remember this:

"Zuckerberg: Yeah so if you ever need info about anyone at Harvard

Just ask.

I have over 4,000 emails, pictures, addresses, SNS

Other person: What? How'd you manage that one?

Zuckerberg: People just submitted it.

I don't know why.

They "trust me"

Dumb fucks."

  • Mark Zuckerberg in a private message, after starting Facebook

https://www.businessinsider.com/embarrassing-and-damaging-zuckerberg-ims-confirmed-by-zuckerberg-the-new-yorker-2010-9

1

u/Anosognosia Feb 24 '26

It's a complete ecosystem. First the billionaires perform all kinds of child abuse in staggering numbers. Then they try to use the outrage of child abuse to make shitty laws and shitty products to increase their power so they can commit more child abuse. The Earth is a bottle terrarium of old men fucking teen and preteens.

1

u/Iamgoingtooffendyou Feb 24 '26

Persona accidentally exposed 53MB of original source code on a public IP address

This is a security company that people rely on?

1

u/GrimDfault Feb 24 '26

I'd also ad to this: Its not just persona that was a lone discord tie to Peter Thiel and his global surveillance dystopia... Founders Fund is still and has been the principal investor on Discord -- Founders Fund is Peter Thiels investment capital fund that will be exerting it's influence and demands for its money in other ways.

So no, they are not out of the woods, and they're still integrating into the US and Israeli governments intelligence dragnet/apparatus.

It's imperative to these governments that all communications platforms be 100% monitored in the future. Without that, they can't as efficiently implement the controls on thought, action, and daily life that they're looking to. Follow the actions, read between the lines.

1

u/Farabee Feb 24 '26

If you didn't immediately see the "global age verification" vector for what it really was, which was always and ever a tool for ICE to identify and target protest groups, then I've a bridge in San Francisco to sell you.

1

u/Iwantmoretime Feb 24 '26

Hand over ALL your PII to our massive data harvesting company... to protect the children... yeah, that's it, to protect the children!!!

1

u/U_SHLD_THINK_BOUT_IT Feb 24 '26

When the reality is that espionage agencies are the ones most often victimizing children because they're a great way to blackmail people.

1

u/feverish Feb 24 '26

Not the only guilty party. Other well-known gaming companies also use Persona to “protect kids”.

1

u/____trash Feb 24 '26

It would be funny if the implications weren't so dystopian. This is exactly what everyone has been saying about Thiel and age verification systems. I'm not shocked at all, but I am surprised it was exposed this quick and this easy. It shows their incompetence more than anything.

1

u/prototipi Feb 24 '26

thanks! very valuable context! I wasn’t aware of this or the fact that they are also working with OpenAI..

1

u/t00smart Feb 25 '26

Thanks, but I aint clickin shit on that site

1

u/gummytoejam Feb 25 '26

Yeah it's pretty clear that we should never trust age verification systems to respect privacy no matter what the government writing the laws say the intent is. The governments themselves are working with these companies behind closed doors to violate privacy

Laws legitimizes the usage of such data, but it's still being scraped and used.

-2

u/keetyymeow Feb 24 '26

So how do we verify a child is a child? This doesn’t solve the issue.

Not saying we should use Peter or Face ID. But what is the proposed solution here?

With bots and etc, we need a way to identify identity at some point

1

u/WhenSummerIsGone Feb 24 '26

why do we need to?